I am looking for a module (or modules) that will create self-evolving sounds...these sorts of sounds are easy to do with plugins but hard to do with typical vcos and filters....i have heard the wooglebug does this...any other ideas?

i am working on building the ez chaos circuit and i hope it will make some self-evolving sounds...maybe not

really looking for things that you hit one note and it keeps going and going and going...or cv sources that keep taking the voltages in different directions.

so far i have built some vcos and filters, etc..they are good building blocks, but i am far from that sound i am searching for.

You know, the lowly Sample and Hold has a lot of potential. I even posted in another forum this weekend about it._________________Garret: It's so retro.
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I think the gist of this is - there isn't really a single "magic" module that will automatically give you animated or self-evolving sounds. What I like to do is set up two or three "strings" of modules that can influence each other. Maybe patch a few things together and then have the output of that modulate something else. Feeding signals back into earlier parts of the chain can be interesting too.

Notice how the two "strings" of modules are cross-connected and will modulate each other. Of course, having voltage control over as many parameters as possible is vital for self-evolving patches. Having several VCAs and LFOs helps too. In the second example above, it might be neat to have another LFO control a VCA that sets the amount of modulation from VCO2 back to VCLFO1. Anyway, there's no set formula, except to apply your imagination and experiment.

HOWEVER, if you're simply looking for chaotic or semi-predictable or even unpredictable modulation sources, then the Wogglebug is a good start, as are some of Ian Fritz's chaos circuits, or even as mentioned before, the lowly S/H.

I am looking for a module (or modules) that will create self-evolving sounds...these sorts of sounds are easy to do with plugins but hard to do with typical vcos and filters....i have heard the wooglebug does this...any other ideas?

Hey Loss, the Woggle doesn't do evolving sounds. in fact its a bit of a one trick pony in my opinion (I've got a real Wiard series 300 version). It's also a beast to tame- making it useless for trying to replicate the same patch twice (but then it only really produces one sound- so that's a contradiction already ).

Lots of SLOW non synched modulation and very gentle CV attenuation, has always done the trick for me.

LOTS of VCAs

THIS is KEY! LOTS of VCAs! They're a major tool in controlling the levels of EVERYthing - especially in such a conflagration.

Another thought / memory that I'd had after I'd previously posted - the Klee itself will become a MAJOR controller tool in this very aspect as opposed to a note generator.

Hour later edit:

For very good and low cost VCAs, go with Ken Stone's. They've become my 'all around VCA' types that I use. My final outputs for recording go through my Charlie Lamm SSM2164 VCAs.
My last build of the Ken Stone ones - I matched the transistors to 3 decimal points to get rid of the feed through. They sound fine so me, as far as my amateur knowledge was able to judge.

(Side note: No I don't work for Ken Stone - just like his stuff, lots'n'lots. )Last edited by Rykhaard on Mon Dec 10, 2007 9:57 pm; edited 1 time in total

Yes, indeed. My "Dynamix" module has been getting a good workout lately. This is a hex VCA module with FET-based attenuators. Mostly useful for slow AM. It also has a fair bit of gentle distortion, which helps increase the interest in slow moving multivoice drones.

So i think what everyone was is saying is that i need the basic stuff in well thought out configurations to get the evolving stuff...i suppose when all i have is a few modules (finished) its easy to think that making something non standard like a wogglebug would be instant weirdness (the kind i love) but i need to be thinking about the connections BETWEEN things, not just relying on one crazy module.

good point.

but i would love to know more about how everyone is using multiple vcas to acheive weirdness...

also, things like quanitizers, slews, dividers, these are things i have never played with...do they add up to good random results? theres nothing like getting sounds you couldnt have dreamed of when you hit a key

Earlier were mentioned Voltage Controlled LFOs. Driving 1 LFO's speed from another, is going to give you something of a lesser predictive occurrence. SLIGHTLY lesser. Add another one controlling the 2nd one, or put 3 in a row.

At some point, you can send the output to a comparator with a controllable trigger level, to trigger something else only at that time.

VCAs? You could put VCAs in at various points here, to have the LFOs at various points control how much of WHAT is going through them. When you're getting down to low frequencies (sub 1hz), you're coming to a lesser often triggering possibility of things. Slowly occurring.

Remember earlier I mentioned the comparator? That could be set to Gate an ADSR that's controlling something else. Only occurs when that Comparator flips.

Another thought that I had tonight at work (2 innovations that I came up with tonight, though I'll remain quiet on the 2nd one for now - till I see if it works on a breadboard) - was to setup a string divider (like an LM3914 for driving LED bar graphs). Take each of those outputs into it's own Attack Decay EG. Each of the EGs would have it's own output, which could then be summed and / or differenced from each other in various ways. All of this would be set off by whatever waveform is input to the thing.

Off on a related tangent: doesn't is suck, when you come up with way more ideas for things, than you have time to actually experiment with / build them?

Ryk is right about the comparator, I like to input 2 LFOs nice and slow and the have it fire an EG for the once in while event.

The UTILITY LFO is a nice one in my book, simple build with lots of output. I would suggest definitely building it with range switching for the time, as well as the JOIN and SWAP for the VARI output, a good bit of oddness can be found there. I made the slow cycle with 10uf electro caps made non polar, 5uf makes for real slow cycles. I just ordered a ton more of Ken's stuff, and cant wait to get it going.

I hadn't looked at the CGS Utility LFO until just now - that looks like a nice project. Ditto the VCA's and LFO's - add some Mixers, too.

I recently built a Triple LFO based on Ray Wilson's Simple Saw and Ramp LFO's specifically for generating gates or triggers in long, complex but eventually repeating patterns. I've used it lots with a dual Bugbrand pattern generator lately.

Autonomous synth patches fascinate me - but my efforts often come up short of being musical in nature (my brain needs some 'structure' I can anchor to...) or they become a bit trite after a few minutes.

Very occasionally - I get an autonomous patch that transfixes me...
I have no idea if anyone else would appreciate it, but I can happily build for hours with the synth bubbling away by itself.

Actually - I'd love to hear what other people are doing with 'noodles' from their hardware analog synths. There really are not a whole lot of recordings of "hands off, no overdub noodles" that I have heard.

Until recently I was lacking a few of the facilities to make this: not now, so I'll definitely be trying it. It has so few parts that I reckon it would be easy to make up a reasonable bank for evolving sounds etc.

If you want to go seriously hardcore, these people have all the tools, but beware, they're a bit of a steep learning curve,(well more of a step function).

Hey Loss, the Woggle doesn't do evolving sounds. in fact its a bit of a one trick pony in my opinion (I've got a real Wiard series 300 version). It's also a beast to tame- making it useless for trying to replicate the same patch twice (but then it only really produces one sound- so that's a contradiction already ).

If the Woggle slow/smooth CV output is the same as the Buchla 265/266 smooth output, this is THE module for truly organic, CV-able unpredictability. It's far more musical than simply filtering noise etc. Add a couple of S/Hs and maybe some analog logic and feed them back to themselves and you have wonderful oceanic modulation source.

I've got some of the boards on order and hope that they fill the bill. If so, they are one of the single most important modules in a synthesizer, in my opinion. I may not even stuff the audio sections; I just want THAT CV. Anything you modulate with it becomes musical. Panning, filtration, amplitude, flangers, etc.

And yes, you'll need a lot of VCAs. Never underestimate the usefulness of multiple VCAs, especially ones that can process control voltages.

Edit: A Wiard JAG module would also be nice, as you can take variations of a single CV and control different things with several different offsets, if I've read the module descriptions correctly.

An analog sequencer such as the Milton or Buchla 246 have analog addressing, which means that if the sequencer clock is not running, a CV at this input will result in the proportional selection of various stages to the CV amount. 0V= stage 1, 5V= stage 12, etc. A sample and hold output to this input is very fun, especially if the clock input is random. You get the feel of where the musical sweet spots are when you use it for a while.

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